A Stone in Time

by Kim Allred

  The captain’s smile faded, and he turned away. After a long pause, he glanced toward AJ. “Maybe I could give you a small tour of the ship.”

  AJ whirled back. “That would be fantastic.” Her own smile faded. She didn’t know this man, and now, out in the middle of nowhere, she had second thoughts about boarding.

  The captain sensed her hesitation. “Of course, we should probably wait until Mr. Jackson arrives. He’s been wanting a tour himself.”

  She tugged at her lower lip. She didn’t know Mr. Jackson any better than the captain. “What time did you say Mr. Jackson would be here?”

  “He tends to run on his own schedule, but I believe I remember him saying something about two.” The captain walked her partway up the path. “Will you be returning?”

  AJ wasn’t sure what to make of this man. A few short minutes ago, he was disturbed by her persistent questions, but now it appeared he didn’t mind if she came back. She couldn’t read his face; he didn’t divulge anything one way or another.

  “I don’t think you told me your name.”

  The captain’s slow grin returned, his look mischievous. “No. I don’t believe I did.”

  AJ sighed, trying to look put out, but unable to hold back her own grin. “May I ask your name, sir?”

  He gave a small bow with his right arm outstretched and increased his brogue. “Aye, it’s Finnian Murphy, but most call me Finn.”

  “All right, Finn. I’ll be back at two o’clock to meet your Mr. Jackson.” AJ refused to look back as she hiked up, but she was dying to know if he still watched her. She swore she could feel those blazing green eyes on her backside. She was almost to the top of the path when she heard him call out.

  “It’s been a pleasure seeing you again.”

  AJ blushed to her roots, lifting her hand in response, refusing to look back, and the sound of a soft chuckle could be heard just above the wind.

  Finn watched AJ walk away, so full of confidence, though she must know he followed her movements. She was tall, athletic, and a bit too thin, but it seemed to suit her height and natural grace. He had put her off guard with his comments, and he found her charming, especially when she spit back.

  But her last name made him curious as to why she was here. He couldn’t be sure, and he didn’t like coincidences.

  When she was gone, he searched his pocket for the prepaid phone he had purchased at the pharmacy. He dialed and waited patiently for several rings. He was about to hang up when the craggy old voice finally answered.

  “Can you meet me at two?” Finn said.

  “I got nothing better to do,” Jackson said and hung up.

  Finn smiled. Something not enough people treasured—a man of few words. He walked back to the ship, but before boarding, another thought came to mind. He reached into another pocket for a slip of paper with several names and numbers. After finding the one he wanted, he made one more call.

  17

  Time dragged, reminding AJ of a few days before when she couldn’t come up with a story. Each minute stretched into ten. After the first hour, she took off her watch and slipped it into the pocket of her jeans so she wouldn’t keep looking at it. The phone was the next distraction, AJ waking it to find the time creeping just as slowly there. At noon, she stopped at the first small store she could find and bought a tolerable lunch. She called Stella, who was distracted and didn’t want to talk, but she agreed to meet AJ for happy hour. She could have driven back to the office, but, after calling in, nothing demanded her attention.

  With the remnants of lunch scattered across the passenger seat of her car, a full stomach, and the sun warming the car, AJ found the stress that had built up from the morning oozing out of her. She leaned her head back and prepared questions for her meeting. If she wrote them down, it would help her stay focused—she had been too scattered that morning. Instead, she drifted off, unsure if it was the distraction of Finn or being unprepared for the interview that made her feel like a novice.

  The chime of her phone dragged her out of her daze. Finally, someone to talk to. It took her a minute to find it, and she answered without checking the caller ID. She was surprised to hear Ethan’s voice.

  “Have I caught you at a bad time?”

  It took a minute for AJ’s head to clear. “No. This is fine.”

  “You sound like I woke you. Not sleeping at your desk, are you?”

  “I’m not at my desk. But I may have been…quietly reviewing my day…and got lost in my thoughts.”

  A small chuckle escaped through the phone. “So you’re napping someplace other than your office.”

  “You should be a detective instead of in security.”

  “There is some intuition in security work. It’s not all brawn.”

  “My mistake.” AJ laughed, fully awake now. She opened the window to let a breeze rustle through the car.

  “I wanted to confirm our visit to the antique shops. Are we still on for Saturday?”

  She had already forgotten and tried to remember why she agreed to a day of antiquing. Her focus should be on her new story, but in truth, she needed to step away and let her subconscious work through it. And she would need some distance from Finn Murphy, who seemed to keep her off-balance. But she also found Ethan to be a good sounding board, and he might have some insights to the inn. “I haven’t had a chance to ask Stella yet, but I’m sure Saturday is still okay.”

  “Great. I’ll let you get back to your nap.”

  “Funny.”

  She disconnected the call and dialed Stella, but again got her voice mail. She left a quick message about Ethan’s invitation and checked the time. Less than an hour to go.

  Recovered from her nap, AJ walked around a small park not far from the inn. The crisp ocean air, the chirping birds, and the sounds of the waves coming on shore woke her senses. The nap had been the perfect antidote to revive her. She ran through her questions. How old was the ship? Where did this captain sail from? Dozens more, assuming she’d get that far. Either way, Finn Murphy would not control her interview.

  When AJ pulled into the lot of the Westcliffe, the two men stood at the top of the path. Finn stood tall over the other man, who appeared bent rather than shorter, like the small firs surrounding the inn, worn down by the winds. She hadn’t paid attention to the second man when she spotted them in the diner. Her focus had been on the captain.

  As she left her car, AJ’s nerves tingled, and she swore, irritated at what was becoming her typical response on seeing Finn. Squaring her shoulders, she increased her pace, forcing the questions she had rehearsed to come back to her.

  Both men turned from their discussion, and their greeting surprised her. Mr. Jackson’s smile was warm and inviting, his chestnut eyes sharp with intelligence. The finest of lines in his face betrayed his age, as did the light gray hair, and the physical bearing of one who had spent many years working a farm or construction. Perhaps both. He wore overalls and a plaid shirt. His rough hands and scraped, dirty nails reflected those of a man acquainted with hard work.

  Finn’s sharp gaze also held a broad smile, but there was something else, as if he were assessing her again, not sure what to make of her. AJ silently cursed. Without even saying a word, he had already taken control of this meeting.

  Before AJ reached them, Mr. Jackson stepped forward with his hand outstretched to take hers. Despite the older man’s calluses, his hand was gentle and his grip firm.

  “I’m Jackson, the caretaker of this old place.” His voice was a deep, rich baritone, like a voice-over for a commercial advertising an exotic liqueur. AJ smiled and took his offered arm. He turned her toward the inn. “Mr. Murphy tells me you have some interest in the old girl.”

  AJ let him guide her, their pace so quick, she wasn’t sure if he was being direct or had some other place he needed to be. Before they reached the porch, AJ extricated herself from Jackson’s grasp, stopped short, and raised her camera. Finn veered off to avoid running her over.

  She ke
pt her voice light. “I gather Mr. Murphy told you about my interest in doing a story on your ‘old girl.’ If you don’t mind I’d like to get a couple of shots before we get closer.” AJ stepped away from them and took her time to frame the shots of the building.

  Jackson appeared impatient and Finn amused, but to their credit, neither man said a word when AJ returned to the path, climbing the stairs to the porch. She ran her hand over the side of the building as she had the first day she’d encountered Finn’s ship. Like the ship, the wood here was also aged but well cared for. “How did you come to be the caretaker of the inn, Mr. Jackson?”

  The old man gazed up to the porch’s ceiling, his eyes unfocused, and he shook his head. “It’s been such a long time, not sure how it originally came to pass. I take care of several homes around here. Most are vacant for the winter, and the owners or renters come for the summer. This is the only one sitting vacant for years.”

  “It seems someone would have bought it ages ago. Its prime real estate,” AJ said.

  “It is surprising that it hasn’t reopened for business, but as for not being sold, that’s not surprising at all.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it hasn’t been for sale.” Jackson turned and hurried along the long front porch, turning toward the back of the house.

  AJ followed with Finn so close behind, she could have swung her arm back and touched him. The old man moved fast, and she increased her pace to keep up with him. “So what can you tell me about the people who own the inn?”

  “Nothing.” Jackson yelled his response over his shoulder and led them around the next turn in the deck to the back of the inn.

  AJ spied a couple of abandoned chairs and a long bench, and for a moment, she caught a fleeting image of inn guests relaxing in the glow of a summer evening, waiting for the sun’s last gasp as it receded from view.

  Jackson stopped halfway to the sitting area, playing at a piece of wood that had pulled away from one of the windows. “Time to bring some tools,” he muttered to himself as he dropped onto the bench and looked out to sea.

  The view was breathtaking, wide open and unencumbered by anything other than the simply landscaped yard, giving way to natural grasses and the wind. Two fir trees hovered off the far deck, as bent as Mr. Jackson, trying to hold their ground against the gusts that often rocked the coast. Today, the sun shone bright against the sea, almost blinding.

  Jackson interrupted the quiet. “Sit down and I’ll tell you what I know about the building, but I won’t speak about the current owners. None of my business.”

  AJ held her sigh and smiled, taking one of the deck chairs and pulling it around to face the man, her back to the sea. Finn positioned a deck chair between her and Jackson, facing it more toward her instead of the storyteller.

  Everyone settled, AJ took out her notepad and directed her interview at Jackson. “Tell me what you know about the inn.”

  Jackson sat back, pulled out a pipe from the front of his overalls, and set it between his teeth. AJ could have sworn she saw a slight puffing although there was nothing in the pipe, and the piece looked as if it had never been used. After a minute, he rested the pipe against his knee.

  “The inn was built in 1911, but it wasn’t an inn at the time. It was built for the Ramseys, who were new to town and fairly well-off. They had a large family, so they needed a lot of rooms. They lived here until the old man died somewhere around the late thirties. Most of the kids had moved away, but the oldest son returned with his wife and children to help his mother. A few years later, the mother passed, and we were at war again. After the attack at Pearl, the young Ramsey joined Civil Defense and became an airplane spotter watching for the Japanese. He was too old to go to war, and the army refused to take him, so he did his duty by being a spotter, to the point that it became an obsession. At least it’s what I’ve read down at the historical society.”

  Jackson stopped and looked pointedly at AJ. “They have some pictures and journals from some of the residents of these older buildings. Have you ever been over there?”

  “Not yet.” AJ mumbled the words, caught like an unprepared schoolgirl. “The first house I wrote about had a great deal of its history still in the house, old pictures and news clippings. I did make a few calls…” She trailed off, irritated she hadn’t thought to call the society. She must have lost her touch during her dry spell. What else could be clouding her thoughts?

  The old man nodded. “The McDowell place. Read the article. Decent job, got most of it right. There wasn’t much more to say about the place.”

  AJ raised an eyebrow and slid a glance to Finn, who, to her dismay, seemed to be studying her. “So the older son became obsessed with spotting.”

  Jackson put the pipe between his lips again. The only thing missing was the rocking chair. She hid her smile. A quick glance at Finn revealed a conspiratorial smile.

  “His wife got tired of it several years after the end of the war,” Jackson said. “He never gave up waiting for an attack, sitting in one of the bedrooms, always watching the sea, sometimes late into the evenings. The upkeep of the place ended up falling to her, so she packed up the kids and left, moved into town. Ramsey stayed until he died in the early sixties, heart attack, stroke, can’t remember. He wasn’t old, but he was nuts. His wife sold it to a young couple. They remodeled it, added a couple of bathrooms, and made it into the inn.”

  The conversation grew silent. There wasn’t much to say about the life of the Ramseys and the final self-destruction of the obsessive patriarch. AJ found disturbing similarities between Ramsey and McDowell. Both men were equally obsessed, one about the sea, and the other about an imaginary foe who could find its way to shore by the same route.

  Finn surprised her by breaking the silence. “So what happened with the inn?”

  Jackson, who had returned to sucking on his pipe and staring out to sea, turned his gaze to Finn. “It was a success for a while, from what I can remember. I was pretty young. But it changed hands a few times in the early years, and I lost track of it. Been closed longer than I can remember.”

  “So who owns it now?” AJ said.

  Jackson looked at her, his expression stoic. “You’ll need to discover that another way. It’s not for me to talk about my employer.”

  “You can’t even tell me who?” AJ said.

  “Nope. Not my place.”

  AJ looked to Finn for help, but he shook his head. No help there. She let it go. She’d find out through county records. She joined the men in gazing out to sea, taking in the lazy warmth for a short time. Seeing that neither man seemed eager to move on, she tried a new tack.

  “Maybe it’s time for that tour of your ship.” AJ hadn’t decided how to tie the ship to the inn. Maybe it warranted its own article. The ship appeared to be older than either of the buildings she had researched. She wasn’t sure Finn would be docked here long enough for her to put a story together.

  “As good a time as any.” Finn slapped Jackson on the knee. “Come on, Mr. Jackson, I know you’ve been dying to get on board.”

  Jackson took longer to stand. “One boat’s as good as the next.” Jackson made it sound dismissive, but he showed a slight grin and tucked the pipe away. He made a beeline for the ship, back the way they had come, not waiting for either Finn or AJ to keep up.

  18

  The ship seemed to invite AJ as she drew near, ready to reveal her secrets. The deck was spotless and freshly washed, the sails tucked and tied sharply in place. The mast seemed to stretch forever into the sky, forcing AJ to lean back to find the small crow’s nest perched on top.

  She strolled along the deck, stopping to examine the rigging. An array of ropes wrapped themselves like snakes around aged wooden pins, holding them in place. Small pieces of brass, scattered here and there, sparkled in the sunlight, and she had to restrain herself from touching, afraid of leaving fingerprints on the shiny surfaces.

  AJ focused so much on the details of the ship, she didn’t no
tice the men had disappeared. She scanned the deck. Faint voices emerged through the light wind, somewhere below deck, and AJ turned toward the stern, searching for a passageway.

  The dark and narrow steps opened to a room. A large table claimed most of the room. A lone tin mug shared space with a large brass lantern that cast a shadowy light through the room. The lit lantern indicated there was no electricity on board, unless it had been retrofitted, but as she reviewed the entire room, the ship appeared as rustic as the day it was built. She ran her hands over the table and along the wall, fingering the base of the lantern, warm from the flame. Why keep it this way? Didn’t the ship have a communication center of some kind? Whether it was a museum piece making its way to another port or some man’s obsessive hobby, AJ couldn’t tell.

  As AJ turned, another table on the far side of the room caught her attention. The navigation area. A chart lay open, spanning the entire surface of the table, carved glass paperweights holding the corners in place. Other charts were rolled and stacked to one side, and even more were kept in open storage cubes under the table. Several instruments lay on the chart. AJ stepped closer. The objects appeared new or well cared for, but if they had been in an antique store, she would have judged them to be a hundred years old, possibly older. AJ leaned over to get a look at the chart.

  Finn’s voice made her turn. He leaned in from a side room.

  “Jackson said you might be interested in the galley and the hold.”

  AJ took a last glimpse at the chart, too far away to see it clearly, and silently cursed. Why did men think women always wanted to see the kitchen? She reluctantly turned from the table. “Have you been plundering the high seas and hold riches for us to see?”

  Finn laughed. “So now you’ve found out my true nature and my pirate ways. It’s good fortune Jackson is here with us to prevent me from sailing away with such a beautiful prize.”